Deadspin | Steven Matz, Rays out to slow road-rampaging Reds 
Apr 20, 2026; St. Petersburg, Florida, USA; Cincinnati Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz (44) hits a RBI single in the third inning against the Tampa Bay Rays at Tropicana Field. Mandatory Credit: Jonathan Dyer-Imagn Images The National League Central-leading Cincinnati Reds have found ways to win despite some dreadful offensive numbers, but their hitters might be finding some form on the current road trip.
Winners of four straight to start a six-game trek, the Reds will look for a second consecutive victory over the Tampa Bay Rays on Tuesday in St. Petersburg, Fla.
Cincinnati led 2-1 after one inning on Monday and never looked back, cruising to a 6-1 victory.
Entering the matchup batting a paltry .178 average with runners in scoring position, the Reds went 4-for-13 on Monday while the Rays finished 0-for-7 in those situations.
As a result, Cincinnati logged a ninth win in 11 road outings.
While the series opener ended up one-sided, the Reds also own impressive records in tight contests: 6-0 in one-run games and 10-0 in games decided by two runs or fewer.
Cincinnati has swept two road series this year, against the Texas Rangers and Minnesota Twins. Last season, the Reds swept just one.
“We’re not always going to hit, but when we’re (right), we can do a lot of things,” Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz said, according to MLB.com. “… Winning always feels good. We’ve just got to keep doing the little things, keep grinding.”
The Reds’ Tuesday starter will be Chase Burns (1-1, 2.42 ERA). The 23-year-old right-hander, a former Wake Forest hurler like Cincinnati’s Monday starter, Rhett Lowder, will face the Rays for the first time.
Burns is coming off his second scoreless start of the season, when he tossed six innings in a no-decision against the San Francisco Giants on Thursday.
The Rays put the first four batters on base against a shaky Lowder on Monday, but they ended the frame only getting a bases-loaded walk by Yandy Diaz, wasting a chance to put up a crooked number.
“We had some good at-bats right away, and then their pitcher got tough,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “Our focus right there is just try to move the ball, put some pressure on the defense. We didn’t. He made some big pitches.”
Tampa Bay will send out surprising Steven Matz (3-0, 3.80 ERA) in the series’ middle game.
Having last pitched as a full-time starter in 2021 with the Toronto Blue Jays, the 34-year-old left-hander has found a resurgence taking the mound every fifth day with Tampa Bay.
Matz has been remarkably consistent in four starts, allowing nine runs on 16 hits in 21 1/3 innings to go with 21 strikeouts and six walks. The opposition is batting .208 against him.
The Long Island, N.Y., native is 4-1 with a 4.46 ERA in eight games (six starts) against Cincinnati, which has a .305 batting average against him.
The Rays are being careful with right-handed starter Joe Boyle, who has been out since April 10 due to a right elbow strain. He likely won’t return to action this month.
“Joe has been on a good run. I think he’s gaining confidence with every outing,” Cash said. “He’s a big, big part of our season, so (we) want to make sure we do right by him and try to freshen him up.”
–Field Level Media
#Deadspin #Steven #Matz #Rays #slow #roadrampaging #Reds
Apr 20, 2026; St. Petersburg, Florida, USA; Cincinnati Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz (44) hits a RBI single in the third inning against the Tampa Bay Rays at Tropicana Field. Mandatory Credit: Jonathan Dyer-Imagn Images The National League Central-leading Cincinnati Reds have found ways to win despite some dreadful offensive numbers, but their hitters might be finding some form on the current road trip.
Winners of four straight to start a six-game trek, the Reds will look for a second consecutive victory over the Tampa Bay Rays on Tuesday in St. Petersburg, Fla.
Cincinnati led 2-1 after one inning on Monday and never looked back, cruising to a 6-1 victory.
Entering the matchup batting a paltry .178 average with runners in scoring position, the Reds went 4-for-13 on Monday while the Rays finished 0-for-7 in those situations.
As a result, Cincinnati logged a ninth win in 11 road outings.
While the series opener ended up one-sided, the Reds also own impressive records in tight contests: 6-0 in one-run games and 10-0 in games decided by two runs or fewer.
Cincinnati has swept two road series this year, against the Texas Rangers and Minnesota Twins. Last season, the Reds swept just one.
“We’re not always going to hit, but when we’re (right), we can do a lot of things,” Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz said, according to MLB.com. “… Winning always feels good. We’ve just got to keep doing the little things, keep grinding.”
The Reds’ Tuesday starter will be Chase Burns (1-1, 2.42 ERA). The 23-year-old right-hander, a former Wake Forest hurler like Cincinnati’s Monday starter, Rhett Lowder, will face the Rays for the first time.
Burns is coming off his second scoreless start of the season, when he tossed six innings in a no-decision against the San Francisco Giants on Thursday.
The Rays put the first four batters on base against a shaky Lowder on Monday, but they ended the frame only getting a bases-loaded walk by Yandy Diaz, wasting a chance to put up a crooked number.
“We had some good at-bats right away, and then their pitcher got tough,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “Our focus right there is just try to move the ball, put some pressure on the defense. We didn’t. He made some big pitches.”
Tampa Bay will send out surprising Steven Matz (3-0, 3.80 ERA) in the series’ middle game.
Having last pitched as a full-time starter in 2021 with the Toronto Blue Jays, the 34-year-old left-hander has found a resurgence taking the mound every fifth day with Tampa Bay.
Matz has been remarkably consistent in four starts, allowing nine runs on 16 hits in 21 1/3 innings to go with 21 strikeouts and six walks. The opposition is batting .208 against him.
The Long Island, N.Y., native is 4-1 with a 4.46 ERA in eight games (six starts) against Cincinnati, which has a .305 batting average against him.
The Rays are being careful with right-handed starter Joe Boyle, who has been out since April 10 due to a right elbow strain. He likely won’t return to action this month.
“Joe has been on a good run. I think he’s gaining confidence with every outing,” Cash said. “He’s a big, big part of our season, so (we) want to make sure we do right by him and try to freshen him up.”
–Field Level Media
![The Carolina Hurricanes made history, but the Stanley Cup is a different story The Carolina Hurricanes are either the best team in hockey, or the biggest frauds in the Stanley Cup Playoffs — it all depends on who you ask. The Canes made history on Saturday night in Philadelphia with their eighth straight playoff win, and their second sweep in a row. It made them the first team in NHL history to sweep their first two series since the 1987 best-of-seven format began, the first team to start 8-0 in the playoffs since 1985, and only the fifth team in NHL history to start the playoffs 8-0.Yet nobody can settle on whether this team is really a Stanley Cup favorite yet.A lot of factors go into the acrimony when discussing Carolina. There’s long-standing bitterness over southern hockey being a thing, especially following back-to-back years of the Florida Panthers hoisting the cup. There’s the fact that the team plays hockey in a manner that runs counter to everything we know about success in the modern NHL. Also, there’s simply a reality that the Canes have had a pretty easy path through the postseason thus far, facing two teams that were bad strategic mismatches for them.What that doesn’t mean, however, is that either the Ottawa Senators or Philadelphia Flyers are “bad teams.” Finishing with 99 and 98 points on the season, respectively, the Sens and Flyers were better than the entire Western Conference Pacific Division, better than the Utah Mammoth who the Golden Knights beat in the first round, and just one win worse than the Bruins, who the Sabres bested in the opening round. Yet, it’s become cool to hate on the Hurricanes’ opponents thus far as a means to discredit Carolina as being a legitimate team — foisting them with criticism no other team in the field is left with.It’s absolutely fair to say that both Ottawa and Philadelphia were thrown into a mismatch blender. Both teams thrived during the regular season when playing on clean ice, with open passing lanes and room to set up plays. This is what the Hurricanes excel at stopping, running brutal forechecks with gutsy defensive rotations that flip the formation to send defensemen up ice to hassle opposing defenseman on the puck, allowing the forwards to stay home.One of the hallmarks of Carolina hockey is to forget the model of play that wins in the NHL, and instead change the game into Hurricanes hockey. They thrive in limiting the effectiveness of star players, making the game be about depth rather than top-line strength, then take over when their third and fourth lines are stronger than their opponents. There’s no coincidence that hockey fans were wondering why Brady Tkachuk and Tim Stützle disappeared in the Sens series, or why Trevor Zegras and Travis Konecny couldn’t make inroads in round two. This was the Canes’ doing, and it worked.This past week Brady Tkachuk explained why it was near-impossible to deal with the Hurricanes’ defense in his series, and noticing that it was happening to the Flyers as well.“Their D… they have the best sticks I’ve ever seen. It was crazy. Some of the plays you’d just be like ‘I can get this through,’ like Slav [Jaccob Slavin] has probably the best stick in the league. I had two Grade-A’s [scoring chances] and they hit his stick and up in the netting. I was like ‘how on earth is that not in the back of the net?’”The length of the Carolina blueliners is causing massive problems for any team trying to play pretty, puck rotation hockey. Throughout the Flyers series we saw the Philly attack get decimated due to deflections from Slavin, K’Andre Miller, and Alexander Nikishin — with their pairings in Jalen Chatfield, Shayne Gostisbehere, and Sean Walker serving more as the more traditional net battlers. This layered defense has been impenetrable in the playoffs and has been offset with the Canes showing more fight and edge that they have previously.So why is there so much doubt that this can carry over to the cup? There are three fair statements to make:The Hurricanes haven’t faced an elite, 90+ point player yet in the playoffsThey’ve been so good defensively that it seems impossible to keep it upCarolina’s best players really haven’t turned up yetForgive the pun, but you can see the storm brewing for Carolina that this incredible run could go south quickly (another pun, sorry). Getting the better of Stützle or Konecny is one thing, but when that caliber of player changes to Nathan McKinnon, Martin Nečas, Nick Suzuki, or Kirill Kaprizov — can this same approach still work? Is there a break point to this defensive dominance where Carolina can be overwhelmed by star players, and if that happens can the Canes recover?That is the real worry right now, and it’s fair to question what is happening with the Carolina top line. The heroes of the playoffs thus far for the Canes has been the Hall/Stankoven/Blake line two, which has been phenomenal — but there has been pronounced quietness from Andrei Svechnikov, Sebastian Aho, and Seth Jarvis on the top line, outside of a few glimmers of magic. We know that historically the NHL playoffs have been won through star power, even by teams like the Panthers who were bruising, but still leaned on Matthew Tkachuk, Sam Bennett, and Brad Marchand to drag them through.If the Canes can’t get that top-line performance firing then there’s a chance they can’t assert their will on the game, which has a domino effect on the rest of the lines, thereby putting more pressure on the defense to bail the team out.The biggest questions about the Hurricanes won’t get answered for some time, with Saturday being the earliest their next series can begin. Whether the Sabres or Canadiens come out of the Atlantic, either team will be the best opposition Carolina has faced, with more star power and deeper lines. If the Canes are able to keep up this dominance in the Eastern Conference Finals then we can really talk about their chances to beat the Avs or Wild in the West.So are the Canes really cup favorites or pretenders? They’re both, and neither, and bizarrely somewhere in the middle. Carolina is a unique Rod Brind’Amour team that approaches hockey in a way no one else does, which means we can’t use the typical yardsticks to measure their potential. It’s all a big guessing game, but that’s what make these playoffs so much fun. #Carolina #Hurricanes #history #Stanley #Cup #story](https://i2.wp.com/platform.sbnation.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2026/05/gettyimages-2275370171.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&crop=0%2C10.744744405714%2C100%2C78.510511188571&w=1200&ssl=1 "The Carolina Hurricanes made history, but the Stanley Cup is a different story The Carolina Hurricanes are either the best team in hockey, or the biggest frauds in the Stanley Cup Playoffs — it all depends on who you ask. The Canes made history on Saturday night in Philadelphia with their eighth straight playoff win, and their second sweep in a row. It made them the first team in NHL history to sweep their first two series since the 1987 best-of-seven format began, the first team to start 8-0 in the playoffs since 1985, and only the fifth team in NHL history to start the playoffs 8-0.Yet nobody can settle on whether this team is really a Stanley Cup favorite yet.A lot of factors go into the acrimony when discussing Carolina. There’s long-standing bitterness over southern hockey being a thing, especially following back-to-back years of the Florida Panthers hoisting the cup. There’s the fact that the team plays hockey in a manner that runs counter to everything we know about success in the modern NHL. Also, there’s simply a reality that the Canes have had a pretty easy path through the postseason thus far, facing two teams that were bad strategic mismatches for them.What that doesn’t mean, however, is that either the Ottawa Senators or Philadelphia Flyers are “bad teams.” Finishing with 99 and 98 points on the season, respectively, the Sens and Flyers were better than the entire Western Conference Pacific Division, better than the Utah Mammoth who the Golden Knights beat in the first round, and just one win worse than the Bruins, who the Sabres bested in the opening round. Yet, it’s become cool to hate on the Hurricanes’ opponents thus far as a means to discredit Carolina as being a legitimate team — foisting them with criticism no other team in the field is left with.It’s absolutely fair to say that both Ottawa and Philadelphia were thrown into a mismatch blender. Both teams thrived during the regular season when playing on clean ice, with open passing lanes and room to set up plays. This is what the Hurricanes excel at stopping, running brutal forechecks with gutsy defensive rotations that flip the formation to send defensemen up ice to hassle opposing defenseman on the puck, allowing the forwards to stay home.One of the hallmarks of Carolina hockey is to forget the model of play that wins in the NHL, and instead change the game into Hurricanes hockey. They thrive in limiting the effectiveness of star players, making the game be about depth rather than top-line strength, then take over when their third and fourth lines are stronger than their opponents. There’s no coincidence that hockey fans were wondering why Brady Tkachuk and Tim Stützle disappeared in the Sens series, or why Trevor Zegras and Travis Konecny couldn’t make inroads in round two. This was the Canes’ doing, and it worked.This past week Brady Tkachuk explained why it was near-impossible to deal with the Hurricanes’ defense in his series, and noticing that it was happening to the Flyers as well.“Their D… they have the best sticks I’ve ever seen. It was crazy. Some of the plays you’d just be like ‘I can get this through,’ like Slav [Jaccob Slavin] has probably the best stick in the league. I had two Grade-A’s [scoring chances] and they hit his stick and up in the netting. I was like ‘how on earth is that not in the back of the net?’”The length of the Carolina blueliners is causing massive problems for any team trying to play pretty, puck rotation hockey. Throughout the Flyers series we saw the Philly attack get decimated due to deflections from Slavin, K’Andre Miller, and Alexander Nikishin — with their pairings in Jalen Chatfield, Shayne Gostisbehere, and Sean Walker serving more as the more traditional net battlers. This layered defense has been impenetrable in the playoffs and has been offset with the Canes showing more fight and edge that they have previously.So why is there so much doubt that this can carry over to the cup? There are three fair statements to make:The Hurricanes haven’t faced an elite, 90+ point player yet in the playoffsThey’ve been so good defensively that it seems impossible to keep it upCarolina’s best players really haven’t turned up yetForgive the pun, but you can see the storm brewing for Carolina that this incredible run could go south quickly (another pun, sorry). Getting the better of Stützle or Konecny is one thing, but when that caliber of player changes to Nathan McKinnon, Martin Nečas, Nick Suzuki, or Kirill Kaprizov — can this same approach still work? Is there a break point to this defensive dominance where Carolina can be overwhelmed by star players, and if that happens can the Canes recover?That is the real worry right now, and it’s fair to question what is happening with the Carolina top line. The heroes of the playoffs thus far for the Canes has been the Hall/Stankoven/Blake line two, which has been phenomenal — but there has been pronounced quietness from Andrei Svechnikov, Sebastian Aho, and Seth Jarvis on the top line, outside of a few glimmers of magic. We know that historically the NHL playoffs have been won through star power, even by teams like the Panthers who were bruising, but still leaned on Matthew Tkachuk, Sam Bennett, and Brad Marchand to drag them through.If the Canes can’t get that top-line performance firing then there’s a chance they can’t assert their will on the game, which has a domino effect on the rest of the lines, thereby putting more pressure on the defense to bail the team out.The biggest questions about the Hurricanes won’t get answered for some time, with Saturday being the earliest their next series can begin. Whether the Sabres or Canadiens come out of the Atlantic, either team will be the best opposition Carolina has faced, with more star power and deeper lines. If the Canes are able to keep up this dominance in the Eastern Conference Finals then we can really talk about their chances to beat the Avs or Wild in the West.So are the Canes really cup favorites or pretenders? They’re both, and neither, and bizarrely somewhere in the middle. Carolina is a unique Rod Brind’Amour team that approaches hockey in a way no one else does, which means we can’t use the typical yardsticks to measure their potential. It’s all a big guessing game, but that’s what make these playoffs so much fun. #Carolina #Hurricanes #history #Stanley #Cup #story")
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